State Profile -- North Carolina

After almost two years of political infighting, dealmaking
and litigation, it was only fitting that North Carolina's
redistricting plan ended up in the nation's highest court.
Besides, it was in keeping with the highly publicized,
circus-like circumstances of the Tar Heel State's mapmaking
process. From the first machinations, to the U.S. Supreme
Court's 1993 decision to allow white residents of the 12th
District to challenge the constitutionality of the new map, the
state's redistricting process was arguably the most convoluted
of any state. Given the follies that marked some other states'
efforts to draw lines for the 1990s, it was an especially
dubious achievement.

The Supreme Court case, Shaw vs. Reno, was brought by five
white voters -- two of whom were 12th District residents -- who
claimed racial separation of voters violated their
constitutional rights. State officials defended the map,
pointing to Voting Rights Act mandates that require creation
and preservation of minority-majority districts whenever
possible. In allowing challenges to "bizarre" and racially
gerrymandered districts, the high court may have opened a
window of opportunity for legal challenges to majority-minority
districts across the country.

North Carolina's story began back in July 1991, when the
state Legislature approved a map that included a black-majority
seat in the rural eastern part of the state. That seat would
likely have elected the state's first black to Congress this
century, but the Justice Department nullified the plan, ruling
that one minority-majority seat was not enough. (Under Voting
Rights Act provisions, North Carolina is one of 14 states that
must have their congressional maps "precleared" by the Justice
Department.)

Legislators responded quickly, revising the map in a January
1992 special session. They created a second black-majority
district, this one an urban-based, heavily Democratic district
that followed the path of Interstate 85 for over 150 miles from
Durham to Charlotte. Republicans were outraged -- they believed
the one-seat reapportionment gain should be theirs -- but the
Justice Department approved this new version one month later.
In fact, under the first rejected version, Democrats actually
conceded the additional seat to the GOP.

At least Republicans could find solace in the fact that the
new map gave three of the party's House incumbents comfortable
seats, all located in the Piedmont region and west. And in the
Asheville-based 11th, voters in 1992 re-elected their first-term
GOP incumbent by a wider-than-expected margin. Prior to that
year, the fickle voters of western North Carolina tossed out
their House incumbent in 1980, 1982, 1984, 1986 and 1990.

The neighboring 10th District qualifies as the state's most
rock-ribbed Republican district. It is the epitome of small-town
North Carolina, with textiles, furniture and agriculture forming
the backbone of the economy. The 9th is also comfortably
Republican, but of a more moderate variety, leavened by the old-
line GOP establishment in Charlotte and the city's working-class
Democrats. Charlotte, the state's most populous city,
transformed during the boom times of the 1970s and 1980s into
the economic colossus of North Carolina and the Southeast,
rivaling only Atlanta in stature.

The third GOP-friendly seat -- the Greensboro-based 6th --
is reliant on textiles and furniture making; in the city of
Greensboro, the economy is a blend of manufacturing and service
industry. A close look at the geography of the 6th reveals a
fissure across the district, which is where the 12th District
cuts through along I-85. The point where the two halves of the
6th connect (congressional districts must be contiguous) is
invisible to the naked eye.

In creating the infamous 12th District, legislators had to
reach into a handful of Democratic-controlled districts to
siphon traditionally Democratic-voting black voters. Black
neighborhoods from Charlotte, Durham, Gastonia, Greensboro, High
Point and Winston-Salem were extracted from other districts and
grafted onto the 12th. Not one whole county is taken in. Piecing
together African American communities was an easier task in the
1st District in the eastern part of the state. Here there are
larger concentrations of black voters, including a string of
majority black counties.

The crafting of two safely Democratic, black-majority
districts sent ripples through the other districts, creating a
handful of competitive seats stretching from the central
Piedmont region to eastern North Carolina. The Raleigh-based
4th has a distinct Democratic advantage, but Republicans find
fertile ground in the 2nd, 3rd, 5th, 7th and 8th districts.

The 2nd takes in parts of Durham and Rocky Mount while
reaching as far south as the Sandhills resort and retirement
communities on the district's southwestern fringe. The rambling
3rd ranges from the tidewater region to the tobacco-producing
areas of the coastal plain. While both districts have
significant Democratic voter registration edges, it no longer
translates into success in statewide or national races. In
recent years, conservative white Democrats have gravitated
toward Republican candidates. In the southeastern 7th, which
takes in parts of Fayetteville and Wilmington, voters have not
strayed quite as far from their Democratic roots.

The 5th and 8th districts cover the north and south central
sections of the Piedmont Plateau. Winston-Salem, an old-time
tobacco town anchors the 5th, which runs along the state's
northwestern tier. Beginning in the 1970s, 5th District voters
began abandoning the Democratic Party in droves, particularly
in presidential election years. The excision of black voters
further damages Democratic prospects, though Democratic Rep.
Stephen L. Neal was re-elected to a tenth term in 1992.

The textile-producing 8th has trended Republican as well,
with the GOP faring best in the I-85 and I-77 corridors.
Charlotte bedroom communities in Union County are also
wellsprings of GOP votes. Democrats find quarter in the poorer,
rural counties in the eastern portion of the district.